Intention to quit amongst Generation Y academics at Higher Education Institutions

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Talent retention is currently an international challenge across industries, and especially foracademic staff at higher education institutions (HEIs) in South Africa. It may be argued thatHEIs are more dependent on the intellectual and creative abilities and commitment of theiracademic staff than most other organisations. For an HEI to maintain a long-term trajectory ofexcellence in terms of both research outputs and teaching, a strong focus on retaining ayounger generation of skilled academics is needed. Unfortunately, in many fields HEIs haveto compete with industry to retain these employees. At the same time, the academicprofession has increasingly fallen behind the private sector in terms of remuneration, amongstothers, resulting in a shortage of young academics in South African HEIs. An investigationinto the intention to quit amongst Generation Y academics at HEIs therefore is justifiable.A mixed-method research design, including both qualitative (focus groups and blog) andquantitative phases (a self-administered questionnaire), was applied. Academics (n = 189) atsix HEIs in South Africa were sampled. The Pearson product-moment correlation coefficientsindicate that employee engagement, transformational leadership, job satisfaction, andremuneration, reward and recognition have a significant negative impact on intention to quit.Based on the multiple regression and partial least square (PLS) path modelling results, it wasfound that only employee engagement and job satisfaction have a significant negative impacton intention to quit. Therefore, the latter variables have the most significant impact onintention to quit amongst the sampled population. However, the PLS path modelling resultssuggest that, by including employee engagement, transformational leadership, jobsatisfaction, and remuneration, reward and recognition in the prediction of intention to quit,45% of the variance will be explained. Relationships between the independent variables werealso found: between employee engagement and job satisfaction; between transformationalleadership and employee engagement; between transformational leadership and jobsatisfaction; and between remuneration, reward and recognition and job satisfaction.This study contributes to the body of knowledge on intention to quit among academics, andspecifically the sought-after Generation Y academics. The findings serve as input for the development of efficacious retention strategies and mechanisms to retain Generation Yacademics at HEIs in South Africa.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University